By The South Asia Times

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar has urged India to respect the Indus Waters Treaty, warning that shared rivers must not be turned into instruments of political pressure and that unilateral action over water could have serious consequences for regional peace and security.

Addressing a seminar on “The Indus Waters Treaty: South Asian Security at the Crossroads” in Washington on Friday, Dar said the treaty was more than an agreement governing water. He described it as a legal framework for managing a vital shared resource, an instrument of regional stability and an important test of the international community’s commitment to the sanctity of treaties.

“Shared waters must never be weaponized,” Dar said at the conclusion of his address, arguing that the rivers should instead remain “a bridge between nations,” governed by law and cooperation.

The remarks come amid continuing tensions between nuclear-armed neighbours Pakistan and India over the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty, which divides the use of the Indus river system between the two countries.

Under the treaty, India received unrestricted use of the eastern rivers -- the Ravi, Beas and Sutlej -- while Pakistan received unrestricted use of the western rivers -- the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab -- subject to specifically defined uses by India. The agreement also established the Permanent Indus Commission and mechanisms for resolving disagreements, including government-to-government discussions, a Neutral Expert and, when required, a Court of Arbitration.

Dar said the treaty had survived more than six decades of wars, military crises, diplomatic disputes and prolonged political tensions.

Its resilience, he argued, demonstrated that even adversarial countries could maintain cooperation when agreed rules were respected.

“The Treaty endured because both countries understood that waters upon which hundreds of millions of lives depend are too fundamental to be subjected to the fluctuations of political relations,” Dar said.

But he said that principle now faces what he described as its “gravest challenge.”

Dar criticised India’s decision in April 2025 to place the treaty “in abeyance,” saying the agreement contains no provision allowing either country to unilaterally suspend it.

“Pakistan’s position is therefore clear and consistent: the Indus Waters Treaty remains valid, binding and fully operative,” he said.

He argued that the issue extends beyond the bilateral relationship, saying it concerns the reliability of international treaties and the wider rules governing relations between states.

“Geography must never become a licence for an upstream State to exercise political leverage over the lives and livelihoods of a downstream population,” Dar said.

For Pakistan, the stakes are particularly high because the Indus Basin supports much of the country's agriculture, food security, energy production and economic activity.

Dar said more than 250 million Pakistanis depend deeply on the Indus river system and described water security as inseparable from economic and food security, as well as national security.

The foreign minister also linked the dispute to climate change, saying Pakistan is already among the world's most water-stressed countries.

He pointed to declining per-capita water availability, changing precipitation patterns, glacial retreat, floods, droughts and increasing fluctuations in water availability as additional pressures on the country's water system.

Rather than weakening cooperation, Dar said climate pressures should encourage Pakistan and India to strengthen it.

He called for improved and transparent data-sharing, sustained technical engagement and collective efforts to increase climate resilience.

“Adaptation cannot mean abandonment of agreed legal rights and obligations,” he said, stressing that climate stress makes treaty-based cooperation more important, not less.

Dar also defended Pakistan's use of treaty mechanisms to address disputes, saying resorting to the Permanent Indus Commission, Neutral Expert or Court of Arbitration should not be viewed as confrontation.

“Dialogue, technical engagement and lawful dispute resolution” were built into the treaty precisely because disagreements between the two countries were expected, he said.

Pakistan, Dar said, remains committed to a peaceful settlement based on sovereign equality, mutual respect and implementation of international obligations.

At the same time, he warned that Islamabad considers any attempt to deprive Pakistan of waters allocated to it under the treaty a serious matter.

“Pakistan will safeguard its legitimate rights and interests under the Treaty and international law,” he said, while emphasising that Islamabad's preferred approach remains “law over unilateralism, dialogue over confrontation, and cooperation over coercion.”

Dar proposed three principles for moving forward: full implementation of the treaty, resolution of differences through its established mechanisms, and restoration and strengthening of technical engagement, transparency and data-sharing between Pakistan and India.

He said the Indus Waters Treaty was built on the recognition that shared geography requires shared rules — a principle he argued remains relevant despite the deterioration in Pakistan-India relations.

“The choice before us today is increasingly clear: between predictability and uncertainty; between cooperation and coercion; and between the rule of law and the politics of unilateralism,” Dar said.

He concluded by calling for the Indus to remain a source of life, livelihood and civilisation rather than becoming another source of confrontation between the two neighbours.

“Shared waters must never be weaponized,” Dar said.